This invention relates generally to a dynamic group bidding protocol (SGBP) and more particularly to a system for conducting multilink sessions through different physical termination points.
FIG. 1 is a prior art internetwork system 12 which includes multiple dial-up network access servers (NAS) 27 also referred to as points of presence (POP). The NASs 27 can be located at different geographical locations around the world. An internet service provider (ISP) 13 operates multiple NASs 27 through a backbone network 16. The ISP backbone network 16 is connected to an internet infrastructure, referred to generally as internet 18. Different remote clients 26A, 26B and 26C dial into one of the NASs 27 in order to access the internet through the ISP backbone network 16.
Local Area Networks (LANs) 22 are typically operated by private companies and include multiple local servers 23A and 23B and multiple local clients 15. The LAN 22 is connected to internet 18 through a home gateway 20. The home gateway 20 includes a firewall 28 that prevents unauthorized external access into the private network 22 through internet 18. While some access is possible from outside the firewall (e.g., electronic mail), resources such as network databases and application programs are only accessible by clients located behind the firewall 28.
An authorized client may need to access files and other resources on network 22 from remote locations, such as when working at home or while on sales trips. Privately operated NASs 24 provide the remote clients with a direct dial-up capability to network 22. Since the NASs 24 are located behind firewall 28, a remote client can dial into the NAS 24 and gain full access to resources on network 22.
In many instances, it is more cost effective for companies to outsource dial-up service to general internet service providers. However, the firewall 28 in home gateway 20 denies access to remote clients that attempt to access LAN 22 through a general internet service provider.
Different network protocols may be used within the internet infrastructure and within the private network 22. For example, the Internet Protocol (IP) is typically used at the network protocol level to send information through the internet 18. However, private networks 22 may use any one of a variety of network protocols including IP, IPX, Appletalk, etc. When a remote client 26B dials into a NAS 27B, the ISP 13 dynamically assigns an IP address to the remote client 26B. The remote client 26B may be denied access by home gateway 20 because the IP address assigned by the ISP network 16 is not one of the authorized addresses in the LAN 22. ISP 13 may not support the network protocol on local network 22. Hence, remote client 26B may be prevented from accessing resources on LAN 22.
Another problem with networked systems is that tasks are not always processed efficiently by the different network resources. Processing is often performed by the computer system that serves as a termination point for transmitted packets. A computer system serving as a termination point might not have sufficient processing power for quickly processing or routing the network packets. Other resources on the network might have more processing power. However, other resources may be overburdened from time to time while processing packets from other network connections.
A link is a connection point provided by a system. The link may be a dedicated hardware interface (eg., an async interface) or a channel on a multi-channel hardware interface (eg., a PRI or BRI). Conventional multilink point to point protocols, such as MLP or X.25, provide additional bandwidth on demand by splitting and recombining packets across a logical pipe (or bundle) formed by multiple links. The bundle is a combination of point to point links that have been negotiated between two peers to run MLP traffic. The MLP reduces transmission latency across slow WAN links by increasing the number of links in the bundle. MLP is described in detail in the PPP Multilink Protocol request for comments (RFC) 1717. MLP cannot operate if the packets are transferred over links originating or terminating on different physical systems.
Large business systems typically use a dial-in pool that includes multiple dial-in servers. Each dial-in server supports a subset of the total number of WAN links. WAN links connecting to the dial-in pool may, therefore, originate or terminate on different dial-in servers. If two WAN links terminate on different dial-in servers in the system dial-in pool, a MLP session cannot be conducted. Thus, restricting MLP sessions to one physical system is not practical for organizations that support large numbers (e.g. hundreds) of WAN access links.
Accordingly, a need remains for improving resource allocation on networks and conducting multilink PPP sessions from different physical termination points.